One Singular Culture in The Arab World - Research Paper Example

1 Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions In the late 1970s, Geert Hostede set about analyzing data for his doctoral dissertation. His task was to analyze over 116,000 surveys collected by IBM from its employees around the world. The result of this analysis would be published internationally in book form in 1980. This book, Culture’s Consequences: International Differences in Work-Related Values, would outline 4 cultural dimensions which would become the most cited and most replicated of all international dimensions to date (Askery, Pounder, and Yazdifar, 2008: 146; Fougere and Moulettes, 2006: 1; Oshlyansky, Cairns, and Thimbleby, 2006: 11). After over two decades of critique and replication in diverse subject areas, Hostede would revise his original text to incorporate new material, publishing the 2nd edition of Culture’s Consequences in 2001. Importantly, Hofstede’s data itself was not updated; rather the text sought to include and analyze significant cross-cultural studies carried out by other researchers during the time between the first and second edition. What were these four cultural dimensions that have had such an impact? The first, power distance, refers to degree that people within a culture accept the inequal distribution of power. As Hofstede defines it, “power distance is a measure of the interpersonal power or influence between (boss) B and (subordinate) S as perceived by the less powerful of the two” (Hofstede, 2001: 83). Cultures which are high in power distance expect power to be distributed unequally; there of often a large gap between rich and poor, and the country is run to a large degree by a powerful elite. Conversely, cultures which are low in power distance tend to have a large middle class, and individuals expect to participate in such things as the running of the country and decision-making in the workplace. The second of Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, uncertainty avoidance, refers to the degree that people feel uncomfortable of threatened by uncertain situations. A country with a high degree of uncertainty avoidance will tend to cling to rules and structure, and will value absolutes and predictability. Meanwhile, a country which is low in uncertainty avoidance will tolerate, even enjoy, unpredictability, flexibility, the acceptance of differences, and relativism (Hofstede, 2001: 148). The third cultural dimension, individualism, refers to the importance placed within a culture on the individual or on the group (Hofstede, 2001: 210). Cultures which are high in individualism put the needs of the individual ahead of the needs of the group, while cultures which are low in individualism tend to define the individuals in terms of their role within the group, and the needs of the individual are subjugated to the needs of the group. The two polarities of this scale are individualism on one side, and collectivism on the other. Finally, the cultural dimension of masculinity refers to the degree that the people within a culture demonstrate behaviours which are considered to be masculine such as “assertiveness, the acquisition of money and things, and not caring for others, the quality of life, or people” (Hofstede, 2001: 279). These values were identified as being masculine because men within nearly every society were found to consider these values to be important, while women placed a lesser importance on them. Interestingly, men held these values even in cultures which were overall more feminine. The opposite polarity to masculinity, femininity, represents such values as caring for others, security, and the quality of life (Hofstede, 2001: 282). Eight years after the publication of Culture’s Consequences, Hofstede added a 5th dimensions, long-term orientation. Based on Confucianism, long-term orientation refers to the degree that a culture is orientated towards the future (perseverance and thrift) or is focused on the present (quick results and enjoying one’s self) (Hofstede and Bond, 1988: 16). This cultural dimension was identified through cross-cultural studies carried out in Asia. The original IBM instrument used by Hofstede was not able to detect this dimension due to its lack of significance in Western cultures, which unintentionally created bias in the (Western-designed) IBM questionnaire (Hofstede, 2001: 352). 1.2 Hofstede’s Cultural Dimension Scores for Seven Arabic-Speaking Countries Hofstede had identified the four main cultural dimensions of power distance, uncertainty avoidance, individualism, and masculinity by analyzing questionnaires gathered from IBM employees within different countries, then comparing and contrasting their responses. As stated above, over 116,000 questionnaires from 66 countries were originally analyzed (McSweeney, 2002: 90). However, due to sampling concerns, questionnaires from some countries were removed. Thus the original cultural dimensions were based on the analysis of surveys from 40 countries; of these, only one was from the Middle East, namely Iran (Hofstede, 2001: 44). After the publication of Culture’s Consequences, Hofstede decided to include other countries which had fallen just short of meeting his original inclusion criteria. Based on initial testing, he now believed that these samples would indeed be adequate. Hofstede had a sample from Arabic-speaking countries in the Middle East which he had excluded from the initial analysis due to sampling concerns. Under the revised criteria, it could now potentially be included. However, when Hofstede revisited the sample, he discovered that it was impossible to determine which questionnaires had come from which countries. Original records within the Middle Eastern division of IBM had been eliminated (Hofstede, 2001: 52). As a whole, the sample did meet the criteria for inclusion, so scores were calculated based on the sample as a whole, and the resulting scores were assigned to the seven countries from which the questionnaires had been gathered: Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, Kuwait, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Hofstede referred to this grouping of countries as the “Arabic-speaking region” (ARA) (Hofstede, 2001: 44). All country scores were calculated in such a way that they would fall between 100 (high in that dimension) and 0 (low in that dimension) for each cultural dimension. On the power distance index (PDI), the seven countries in the ARA have a score of 80 (Hofstede, 2001; 87), which means that they are considered to be very high in power distance. On the uncertainty avoidance index (UA), these countries have a score of 68 (Hofstede, 2001: 151), making them moderately high in uncertainty avoidance. On the individualism index (IND), these countries were found to have a score of 38 (Hofstede, 2001: 215), meaning they are moderately low in individualism (in other words, moderately high in collectivism). On the masculinity index (MAS), the score is 53 (Hofstede, 2001: 286), meaning that they are moderate in masculinity. No scores were calculated for the cultural dimension of long-term orientation. As the original instrument, namely the IBM survey, had failed to detect the cultural dimension of long-term orientation, scores were not calculated for this dimension from any of the original IBM data (Hofstede, 2001: 351). 1.3 Major Criticisms of Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions Despite the success and acceptance of Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, which are arguably the most cited and replicated of any cultural dimensions, (Askery, Pounder, and Yazdifar, 2008: 146; Fougere and Moulettes, 2006: 1; Oshlyansky, Cairns, and Thimbleby, 2006: 11), since the publication of Culture’s Consequences, many criticisms have been levied at Hofstede’s work. One of the most consistent criticisms is that Hofstede has defined culture in national terms (Baskerville-Morley 2005: 391; Fougere and Moulettes, 2006: 1). In other words, national borders are supposed to delineate where one culture begins and another ends. This approach to culture does not address nations which contain a diversity of cultures within their borders, such as Lebanon, nor cultures which transcend national borders, such as the Assyrians in Iraq and Syria (Zaharna, 2009: 182). Another common criticism of Hofstede’s study is that it did not consider the influence of organizational and occupational culture on the IBM sample. As the sample was drawn from only one company, it must be considered to what degree the employee responses reflected the organizational culture of IBM, especially as organizational culture has been found to highly influence cultural determinations (McSweeney, 2002: 92). Another variable is the fact that most of the sample consisted of employees engaged in marketing-plus-sales positions within that company, raising the question of to what degree the occupational culture of marketing-plus-sales types of jobs have influenced Hofstede’s cultural findings (McSweeney, 2002: 92). Another significant criticism levied against Hofstede is his belief that cultural determinations are quite static and tend to persist over time, despite studies indicating that culture changes and adapts over time (At-Twaijri and Al-Muhaiza, 1996: 121). Connected to this is another criticism, namely that Hofstede’s original sample, collected in 1968-69 and 1971-74, is now about 40 years old (Baskerville-Morley, 2005: 391). Despite this, Hofstede claims that his original cultural determinations, made on the basis of this data, have enduring validity. According to Fougere and Moulettes (2006:7) Hofstede’s resistance to the belief that culture can change over time has led to the lack of any attempts on his part to update his research with a new analysis of new data. Other methodological concerns have been persistently raised. The small average number of surveys per country is one such problem. According to McSweeney (2002: 92) the sample size used was often too small to be considered a representative sample. As McSweeney states “were an academic to claim that she or he had been able to compare the ‘intelligence’ of the populations of two particular nations on the basis of the examination results of, say, 88 and 58 students, his or her views would be rightly scorned” (2002: 92). Not only was the average sample size quite small, but it also was not representative of the population arguably being examined. This is true on a number of levels. First, the sample was not drawn from the general population of a country, but rather exclusively from IBM employees within that country (Fougere and Moulettes, 2006: 1). Second, the majority of the questionnaires were from marketing-plus-sales employees (McSweeney, 2002: 93). In addition, there were many other characteristics which made the IBM sample unique, and not representative of the nation in general, including the fact that it was drawn from the middle classes (Hofstede, 1980: 56); was largely male (Alexander, 1993: 309); and the employees in the sample had above average levels of international exposure due to the nature of their jobs (Hofstede, 1980: 55). In 2005, Baskerville-Morley published an article in which she listed 14 different criticisms that have been made against Hofstede (391). According to Baskerville-Morley (2005: 391), the five most common, significant, and persistent criticisms that have been made are: that surveys are not a suitable way of measuring cultural differences; that nations are not the best units for studying culture; that a study of subsidiaries of one company cannot provide information about entire national cultures; that the IBM data is old and therefore obsolete; and that four or five dimensions is not enough to adequately describe the many nuances of culture. Baskerville-Morley (2005) joins others such as McSweeney (2002) in agreeing that Hofstede has not done enough to effectively address the significant and numerous questions that have been raised about his research. 1.4 Criticisms of Hofstede’s Cultural Dimension Scores for Seven Arabic-Speaking Countries As described above, Hofstede’s sample from the seven countries he would later include in the Arabic-Speaking Area (ARA) was gathered internally within IBM in two waves, from 1968-69 and 1971-73. In the first wave, 79 surveys were gathered. In the second wave, 62 surveys were gathered (Hofstede, 2001: 482). Added together, the total sample, drawn from the Middle East division of IBM, and representing seven individual countries, was 141. It is not known what percentage of this total of 141 came from each of the seven countries. However, if we divide 141 by 7, we come up with an average of 20 surveys per country. This raises the question of whether a sample size of 141 is statistically reliable for computing the national culture scores of seven countries. Although Hofstede agrees that this situation is not ideal (Hofstede, 2001: 52), he still felt that the sample size was statistically valid enough to warrant inclusion of these seven countries. Importantly, he did not include them as a region, but rather computed the scores for the region and assigned these scores as representing the individual scores of each nation. Traditionally, there has been the belief that cultures which share three main variables, namely geographic proximity, religion, and language, will culturally be very similar (Ronen and Shenkar, 1985: 446). This belief has been heavily applied to the countries of the Arab world, which have often been defined as sharing one common culture, rather than as having individual cultures (Zaharna, 2009: 279). This is compounded by the fact that relatively few studies have been carried out which actually examine differences between Arab countries (Robertson, et al. 2001: 224; Ronen and Shenkar, 1985: 451; Smith, Achoui, and Harb, 2007: 276). Rather, it is much more common for one Arab country, for example, to be included in a cross-cultural study, and then for the cultural determination of that country to be generalized as applying to the greater Arab world (Smith, Achoui, and Harb, 2007: 276). This implicit belief that the countries of the Arab world share one culture seems to lie at the heart of Hofstede’s treatment of the seven countries in the ARA. But is this true? Do cultural differences exist within the Arab world? Arguably the most significant cross-cultural study conducted since Hofstede’s identification of his cultural dimensions, the on-going GLOBE study is “a long-term multi-method, multi-phase, cross-cultural research programme concerned with the differential effects of leadership and organisational practices and values in 61 countries” (Abdalla and Al-Homoud, 2001: 507). Five Arab countries have been included in the GLOBE study: Egypt, Kuwait, Morocco, Qatar, and Turkey (Gupta, Hanges, and Dorman, 2002: 13). In one GLOBE study, Kabasakal and Bodur examined data taken from these five countries. Although the cultural findings were generally uniform, differences between countries were identified (2002: 48, 50). In another GLOBE study, Askary, Pounder, and Yazdifar (2008) examined the impact of culture on accounting practices in Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia. They found that while these cultures were deemed to be generally similar, differences did exist, most notably between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia (2008: 152). In a critique of the GLOBE studies, Smith, Achoui, and Harb (2007) point out the tendency of the researchers to ignore culture on a national level within the Arab world, but instead to apply the aggregated results to the entire cluster of “Arab” countries (even though, as the authors point out, Turkey is not Arabic). According to the authors, the commonalities of the Islamic religion and the Arabic language throughout the region have caused researchers to generalize about shared aspects of Arab culture. According to Ali and Ali-Shakhis, while there is an Arab identify and a sense of pride in being Arab, at the same time there are significant differences between countries in the Arab world (1989: 171). History, social norms, traditions, the presence of minorities, as well as political and economic systems are just some of the factors which vary from country to country (Ali & Ali-Shakhis, 1989: 171; Smith, Achoui, and Harb, 2007: 278). There are also differences in the degree of economic development as well as the level to which the labour force has been educated (Harnish, 2003: 48). While it is true that Arabic is a common language to the countries included in the ARA, according to Dirani (2006: 88) there are many different standards of Arabic, making its use as a common language impossible. Additionally, the second unifying force, religion, does not recognize that Islam is divided into numerous sects and sub-sects. According to Dirani, “although several commonalities exist, differences among the Arab countries are paramount” (2006: 88). According to Zaharna (2009: 179), “a new generation of scholars is arguing that the Arab culture should no longer be seen as singular but rather as a group of diverse social customs representing a tapestry of cultures within the Arab world”. An illustrative example of cultural and societal differences between two countries included in Hofstede’s ARA cluster can be found in the work of Ali and Al-Shakhis (1989). These researchers examined differences in managerial work beliefs among Saudi and Iraqi managers. 203 Iraqi and 132 Saudi managers completed questionnaires to measure their belief systems. Significant differences between the two samples were found. Iraqi managers were found to be more committed to egalitarian and humanistic beliefs than the Saudi managers, and also to be less individualistic than the Saudi managers (1989: 183). Interestingly, while both of these countries are included in Hofstede’s ARA cluster, and meet the normal criteria for similarity, namely geographic proximity, shared religion, and shared language (Ali and Al-Shakhis, 1989: 171), they are different in many ways. At the time of the study, Iraq represented a more socialized, centrally planned society while Saudi Arabia essentially relies on a free enterprise system (169). They also differed religiously, with Iraqis being primarily Shiite Muslims and Saudis being primarily Wahhabi, a Sunni sect (169). In Iraq, political organizations, labour unions, and women played a greater role in society, both economically and politically, than they did in Saudi society, where labour unions and political organizations are forbidden, and the role of women in society is restricted. Other studies have identified cultural differences between countries included in Hofstede’s ARA cluster. Smith, Achoui, and Harb (2007) examined middle and upper managers from Qatar, Oman, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia in an attempt to gain further understanding of cross-national variations in leadership. They found that the Saudi sample behaved in more traditional ways, while the managers from the three other countries varied significantly from this norm in ways consistent with theories of modernity. Thus the research results did not support the premise that there is a relatively uniform style of leadership across Arab countries (2007: 87). Similar results were found by Robertson, Al-Habib, Al-Khatbib, and Lanoue (2001), who examined beliefs about work among 365 managers and employees from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Oman. They found that Saudi Arabia was more traditional in its work beliefs, while Kuwait and Oman appeared to be more influenced by external forces (2001: 240). Specifically, Saudi work beliefs were found to be unique, while Kuwaiti and Omani work beliefs were found to be more similar to those found in the West (2001: 240). While research suggests that cultural differences do exist within the Arab world, another question to be addressed is the actual validity of Hofstede’s cultural dimension scores for Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, Kuwait, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, the Arabic-speaking countries to which he assigned scores. Oshlyansky, Cairns, and Thimbleby (2006) carried out a straight replication of Hofstede’s original research. They used Hofstede’s Value Survey Module (VSM), the instrument designed by Hofstede based on the original IBM survey to accurately assess the degree of his five cultural dimensions. The subjects were students from nine countries, including 91 students from Saudi Arabia. Results of the survey failed to support Hofstede’s scores for even one of the nine countries included in the study. The cultural dimension scores for Saudi Arabia were as follows: PDI was found to be 29 (compared to Hofstede’s 80); UA was found to be 94 (compared to Hofstede’s 68); IDV was found to be 88 (compared to Hofstede’s 38); and MAS was found to be 50 (compared to Hofstede’s 52). Baron (2008) surveyed 200 dental students enrolled in the dental program at the University of Sharjah, located in the United Arab Emirates. 88% of the sample was female; 22% percent were under the age of 20 while 78% were between the ages of 20 and 24. 79.5% of the sample was from countries categorized as belonging to the Arab World. 61% of the total sample consisted of students from the countries included in Hofstede’s ARA cluster, specifically Egypt, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Saudi Arabia, or the United Arab Emirates. Hofstede’s VSM was use to measure culture. Results considerably differed from Hofstede’s findings. PDI was found to be 13.4 (compared to Hofstede’s 80); UA was found to be 58.1 (compared to Hofstede’s 68); IDV was found to be 89.7 (compared to Hofstede’s 38); and MAS was found to be 12.4 (compared to Hofstede’s 52) (2008: 4). Thus the study’s findings only support the UA score that Hofstede assigned to the countries in the ARA cluster. The results of Baron’s study also indicate that various factors, such as the extent of education, occupation, gender, age, and socio-economic status, influence culture dimensions (2008: 11). It should be noted that while the study carried out by Baron (2008) lends support to the notion that cultural differences do exist between the countries included in Hofstede’s ARA cluster (specifically Egypt, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Saudi Arabia, or the United Arab Emirates), these countries did make up only 61% of the total sample. It is unfortunate that this sample was not isolated and used as the basis for compiling cultural dimension scores for these countries exclusively. As it now stands, Baron’s findings must be accepted with some degree of reservation. The failure to replicate Hofstede’s cultural dimension scores despite using the very tool designed by Hofstede to accurately measure culture, raises serious questions about the validity of the original instrument. One drawback of the original IBM survey is that it was not designed to measure culture; instead it was designed for a completely different purpose. Additionally, a very few number of questions were taken from the original survey and identified as being accurate measures of cultural dimensions. It is common, for example, for the presence of a cultural dimension within a culture to be measured with as little as 3 questions. According to Smith (2002: 121), another problem is that Hofstede himself has not attempted to validate his instrument. When others raise objections about its validity, Hofstede, according to Smith, focuses on validating the results gathered by the instrument, as if hoping that by validating the results, by extension the instrument will be validated as well. When considering the uniformity and accuracy of Hofstede’s cultural determination for the Arab region, it may be interesting to look at the example of the former Yugoslavia. The former Yugoslavia was one of the 40 countries included in the initial 1980 version of Culture’s Consequences. It was found to have a PDI score of 76, a UA score of 88, an IND score of 27, and a MAS score of 21. Unlike the other surveys included in the study, these surveys were not from IBM, but rather from an independent company which worked closely with IBM (Hofstede, 2001: 46). This company was based in Ljubljana (Slovenia), with branch offices in Zagreb (Croatia) and Belgrade (Serbia). The overall sample for Yugoslavia, collected in 1971 from these three administrative centers, consisted of 248 individuals. After the dissolution of Yugoslavia in 1991, Hofstede revisited the original Yugoslav samples in order to obtain cultural dimension scores for three former Yugoslav republics: Slovenia, Croatia, and Serbia. The basis for dividing the original sample of 248 was the location of the company branch where the surveys were administered. The result was cultural scores which were sometimes similar, as is the case for the uncertainty avoidance and individualism scores, but sometimes different from each other, as was the case for the power distance score, and especially the masculinity score, which saw Serbia with a score of 43 (moderate) on one hand and Slovenia with a score of 19 (highly feminine) on the other (Hofstede, 2001: 501). This example illustrates how one “country” actually contained significant cultural diversity. If this was true for a country the size of Yugoslavia, it seems plausible that similar differences can exist between the countries of the Arab world. Despite the significance and widespread acceptance and attempts to replicate Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, serious challenges to their validity and applicability have been raised. Of particular concern is his treatment of the countries of Egypt, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Not being able to identify what percentage of the overall Arab country sample came from which country, he analyzed them as an aggregate. Based on this analysis, he established cultural dimension scores for the group, but, based seemingly on the belief that the Arab world shares one culture, assigned these scores to each of the individual countries. This section has reviewed some of the concerns about Hofstede’s methodology in general, and with regard to the countries of the ARA cluster in particular. The next section of the paper will attempt to explore this question further, namely, whether the countries of Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, Kuwait, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates can be said to share one culture, or whether cultural differences between these countries exist. References Abdalla, I.A. & Al-Homoud, 2001. Exploring the implicit leadership theory in the Arabian Gulf states. Applied Psychology: An International Review, 50(4), pp.506-531. Alexander, J.C., 1993. The promise of a cultural sociology: technological discourse and the sacred and profane information machine. N. Smelser and K Munch, eds., Theory of culture. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. pp.293-323. Ali, A. & Al-Shakhis, M., 1989. Managerial beliefs about work in two Arab states. Organizational Studies, 10(2), pp.169-186. Askary, S., Pounder, J.S., & Yazdifar, H., 2008. Influence of culture on accounting uniformity among Arab nations. Education, Business and Society: Contemporary Middle Eastern Issues. 1(2), pp.145-154. At-Twaijri, M.I. & Al-Muhaiza, 1996. Hofstede’s cultural dimensions in the GCC countries: an empirical investigation. International Journal of Value-Based Management, 9(2), pp.121-131. Baron, J.A., 2008. Cultural values and beliefs from an educational perspective in the Arab world. In: Proceedings of the Education Research Group of Adelaide (ERGA) conference. 24-25 September 2008, pp.1-12. Baskerville-Morley, R.F., 2005. A research note: the unfinished business of culture. Accounting, Organizations and Society, 30(4), pp.389-391. Dirani, K., 2006. Exploring socio-cultural factors that influence HRD practices in Lebanon. Human Resource Development International, March, 9(1), pp.85-98. Fougere, M. & Moulettes, A., 2006. Development and modernity in Hofstede’s Culture’s Consequences: a postcolonial reading. Lund Working Paper Series, Lund Institute of Economic Research, 2006/2. Gupta, V., Hanges, P.J., & Dorfman, P., 2002. Cultural clusters: methodology and findings. Journal of World Business, 37(1), pp.11-15. Harnish, D., 2003. Camels and camshafts: career and technical education in the Persian Gulf. Techniques (Association for Career and Technical Education), 78(8), pp.44-48. Hofstede, G., 1980. Culture’s consequences: international differences in work-related values. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage. Hofstede, G., 2001. Culture’s consequences: comparing values, behaviors, institutions, and organizations across nations. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Hofstede, G. & Bond, M.H., 1988. The Confucius connection: from cultural roots to economic growth. Organizational Dynamics, 16(4), pp.4-21. Kabasakal, H. & Bodur, M., 2002. Arabic cluster: a bridge between East and West. Journal of World Business, 37(1), pp.40-54. McSweeney, B., 2002. Hofstede’s model of national cultural differences and their consequences: a triumph of faith-a failure of analysis. Human Relations, January, 55(1), pp.89-104. Oshlyansky, L., Cairns, P., & Thimbleby, H., 2006. A cautionary tale: Hofstede’s VSM revisited. In Proceedings of the 20th BCS HCI Group Conference (Vol.2, pp. 11-15). London: British HCI Group. Robertson, C.J., Al-Habib, M., Al-Khatib, J.A., & Lanoue, D., 2001. Beliefs about work in the Middle East and the convergence versus divergence of values. Journal of World Business, fall, 36(3), pp.223-244. Ronen, S. & Shenkar, O., 1985. Clustering countries on attitudinal dimensions: a review and synthesis. Academy of Management Review, 10(3), pp.435-454. Smith, P.B., 2002. Culture’s consequences: something old and something new. Human Relations, January, 55(1), pp.119-127. Smith, P.B., Achoui, M., & Harb, C., 2007. Unity and diversity in Arab managerial practices. International Journal of Cross Cultural Management, 7(3), pp.275-289. Yousef, D.A., 2003. Validating the dimensionality of Porter et al.’s measurement of organizational commitment in a non-Western culture setting. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 14(6), pp.1067-1079. Zaharna, R., 2009. An associative approach to intercultural communication competence in the Arab world. In: D.K. Deardorff, ed. The Sage handbook of intercultural competence. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. pp.179-195. Read More